Charles Elachi Biography

Charles Asshur Al-Wadad Elachi (born April 18, 1947 in Lebanon) is the Director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), located in Pasadena, California. He has held this position since May 1, 2001 and also holds professorships in electrical engineering and planetary science at Caltech. He is also a member of the Board of Trustees of the Lebanese American University (LAU).

Elachi is the director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and vice president of the California Institute of Technology.

Elachi has been a principal investigator on a number of research and development studies and flight projects sponsored by NASA. These include the Shuttle Imaging Radar series (science team leader), the Magellan imaging radar at Venus (team member), and the Cassini Titan radar (team leader). He is author of more than 230 publications in the fields of active microwave remote sensing and electromagnetic theory, and holds several patents in those fields. He taught the physics of remote sensing at Caltech from 1982 to 2001.
As JPLs director for space and Earth science programs from 1982 to 2000, he was responsible for the development of numerous flight missions and instruments for Earth observation, planetary exploration, and astrophysics.

In 1988, the Los Angeles Times selected him as one of Southern Californias rising stars who will make a difference in L.A. In 1989, asteroid 1982 SU was renamed 4116 Elachi in recognition of his contribution to planetary exploration.

In 1989, Elachi was elected to the National Academy of Engineering and has served on a number of academy committees.

He has chaired a number of strategic planning committees for NASA. He has lectured in more than 20 countries about space exploration and Earth observation. He participated in a number of archeological expeditions in Egypt, Oman and China.

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